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I struggled with how to frame my blog about this movie. I have plenty to say, I just have no idea how to say it. My biggest fear, in summarizing The Long Walk Home was not an issue of finding something profound to say. Any profundity was found, and made, in the midst of this movie’s hour-forty runtime. I just wanted to make sure I wasn’t being trite.

In discussing this movie (through the sobs) to multiple people, I heard many insightful things from many people. The one statement that stuck with me, however, was a friend telling me that “it’s good that you can’t fathom this happening. It means we’re changing. It means we’re maturing.” 52 years later, I do believe we’re maturing but I will hesitate to say that we’ve matureD. I think great steps have been made in thte fact that this movie can induce tears. The violence, racial epithets, and near-Klan meetings are all deplorable to us, and thank goodness this is the case. 

I’m not sure what my point is here, and I do fear that I have essentially been rambling for the past couple paragraphs. As I said in the wiki, this is a hard movie to discuss, because it’s a period that is hard to admit is part of our history. But what made this movie so effective, what made it so AFFECTING, is that it was right. As much as it was a historical document, it was also a cautionary tale, much along the lines of Schindler’s List or, in a non-historical sense, Requiem For a Dream. (Anyone brave enough to sit through either knows how I can make the emotional connection.) These all work as a reminder of how dangerous human nature can be. I just hope enough people are wise enough to pay attention.

 

Oliver Stone behind the camera

It is with such a claim, that 3-time Oscar winner Oliver Stone begins his grandiose attempt at alternate history. He is often proved wrong, and at many junctures through his interviews regarding JFK, he readily admits to altering details to allow for a more Hollywood-ready story. However, he succeeds in asking many important questions, ruffling the feathers of several higher-ups, and if nothing else, forcing the nation to reconsider exactly what happened that November afternoon in Dallas, Texas. Perhaps, this was his only intent. Perhaps he never wanted to be “right,” or solve a decades-old whodunit. But the truth is, and must not be ignored, that he is, in multiple examples, very wrong.

Stone begins his arguments in his typical style, with a frenetic collage of voices and images. When the voices whisper, the images scream with a primal violence that only Stone can achieve. The movie begins with a fast-paced overview of all the reasons why someone in the United States of Oliver may have wanted Kennedy out of the picture for good.

As motive goes, according to Stone, there is plenty to choose from. The April 1961 Bay of Pigs disaster resulted in the death of 114 American soldiers. Allen Dulles, the director of the CIA – an agency that Kennedy detested – is fired soon after.[2] In November of 1963, Kennedy demands a by-Christmas withdrawal of 1,000 troops from Vietnam, hoping to have a complete pullout after the 1964 election, believing Americans shouldn’t be expected to stop a Communist regime 9,000 miles away if they couldn’t stop one from ninety. [3]

Fidel Castro and Nikita Khrushchev

The problem is, none of these reasons are valid. Kennedy’s Secretary of State, Dean Rusk, never heard JFK discuss a withdrawal from Vietnam.  Bobby Kennedy agreed, saying that “the President felt he had a strong, overwhelming reason for being in Vietnam…the loss of Southeast Asia if you lost Vietnam.”[4] Furthermore, it has been stated that “his final speeches bristled with anti-Soviet rhetoric” and he was working towards a coup of Castro’s rule in Cuba. Thusly, if JFK was anti-Castro, anti-Soviet, and not turning dove, who could possibly have motive to kill Kennedy other than an off-the-rails former Marine rifleman posted in the window of a building on a Dallas street?

 

An off-the-rails, former Marine rifleman. AKA, Lee Harvey Oswald

However, motive is only one of many issues found within Stone’s epic. His main protagonist, Jim Garrison, worked a theory so unrealistic in his failed prosecution of Clay Shaw that it took the jury less than an hour to find Shaw not guilty. The issue at the heart of this, the one piece of evidence that many people see as the absolute end-all proof of conspiracy, is the idea that there were not necessarily multiple shooters responsible for Kennedy’s death, but multiple people ensuring that Oswald would successfully take the shots, creating the idea that Oswald did not act alone.

The issue with this is, it contradicts just about every federal investigation and document stating otherwise. The Warren Commission, which spent nine months coming to the conclusion that Oswald was the only shooter, is deemed to be wrong not just by the characters in Stone’s film, but by Jim Garrison himself in his book On the Trail of the Assassins. As an examination of his trial of Clay Shaw, Garrison reiterated his point that Kennedy was assassinated as part of a conspiracy involving Oswald, Shaw and David Ferrie.

Joe Pesci as David Ferrie

Tommy Lee Jones as Clay Shaw

The bullet in question is said to have entered the back of Kennedy’s neck, exited through the front, struck the front seat passenger Governor Connally in the ribcage and lodged itself in his thigh. Detractors from this conclusion state that the path the bullet took zigged and zagged, hitting areas that would be impossible for a bullet to strike given a normal, logical path, unless the wounds were caused by multiple bullets from multiple shooters.

This is further “explained” by the idea that for all the shots to hit in the short amount of time, a near-impossible aiming skill would be necessary for there to only be one shooter. It’s a rather convenient explanation. Three shots, mere seconds elapse, of COURSE all three could hit with two shooters, when only one man is responsible for firing more than one shot!

However, all three shots did not make contact. As the Warren Commission determined, one of the three shots (although it is unclear which) missed entirely. It is determined that the time span between Kennedy’s neck and head shots was “approximately 4.8 to 5.6 seconds.” Furthermore, they determined that if the second shot missed, that this would be the total amount of time between all three shots. However, if either shots #1 or #3 missed, there would need to be 2.3 seconds of time added to account for rifle operation, bringing the total time to between 7.1- 7.9 seconds…two bullets probably caused all the wounds suffered by President Kennedy and Governor Connally.” [5]

The Warren Commission exhibit on the trajectory of the "magic bullet"

The next major issue is the portrayal of the second conspirator, David Ferrie. While Joe Pesci does a masterful job as the MOVIE version of Ferrie, a paranoid, hyperactive man who hated Kennedy and believed HEARTILY in the fight to assassinate Kennedy, the true Ferrie was a devout Kennedy supporter and a staunch opponent of Castro. Furthermore, despite the movie’s insistence that Ferrie was murdered after confessing to the conspiracy [6], he was neither murdered nor ever a confessor to conspiracy against Kennedy. 

Ferrie died of a cerebral hemorrhage, not the foul play depicted in JFK. As writer James Phelan explains, “a berry aneurysm is a congenital defect. David Ferrie had been born with a weak artery wall in his hairless head, and it picked a dreadful time to give way.” [7] Garrison’s ADA stated in a History Channel documentary that “we went to Jim and said ‘your main witness is dead…you can’t go any further.’ He looked at us and said ‘are you crazy? We’re just getting onto something here.’” [8]

As for his “confession,” it wasn’t really like Ferrie got a chance. Although requesting face time with Garrison on several occasions, as well as repeated requests to try lie-detector and truth serum tests, he was turned down, repeatedly, by Jim Garrison himself.[9] If Ferrie never got the chance to confess before his death of natural causes, how could he POSSIBLY be a murdered killer as depicted in JFK?

The answer is creative license. When you are the winner of a Best Picture and two Best Director Oscars before you begin filming this one, you can pretty much do whatever you want and call it art. However, as countless articles have shown, it is art, and not history. One educated on the Warren Report, the investigation’s involved parties and Jim Garrison himself can point out dozens of errors with the complete retooling of Garrison’s case. After watching the film, reading the articles and doing multitudes of other research, it becomes clear that much like Dan Quayle, Oliver Stone’s depiction is No Jack Kennedy.

---

[1] Graham Fuller. “The Unstoppable Stone.” Interview. Jan. 1996.

[2] Warren Hinckle and William W. Turner. The Fish Is Red. (New York: Harper & Row, 1981), 112.

[3] JFK. Dir. Oliver Stone. Perf. Kevin Costner. DVD. 2002. 

[4] Reeves, Thomas C. The Journal Of American History 79 (1992): 1264.

[5] The Warren Commission.

[6] JFK. Dir. Oliver Stone.

[7] James Phelan, Scandals, Scamps and Scoundrels: The Casebook of an Investigative Reporter (New York: Random House, 1982), pp. 141-42.

[8] Time Machine: False Witness. History Channel. 2000.

[9] Patricia Lambert. False Witness. (New York: M.Evans and Co, 1992), 62.

I HEREBY PLEDGE TO HAVE NEITHER GIVEN NOR RECEIVED ANY AID ON THIS PROJECT.

-Nick “Cash” Nelson

John F. Kennedy was one of the most revered public leaders of our time. Popular, handsome and knowledgeable, he took the nation by storm. However, his assassination in November of 1963 is shrouded in mystery, speculation, and conspiracy theories. One of those theories is examined in Oliver Stone’s JFK. It will be the job of the following few posts to show in a clear, objective manner that Oliver Stone, though adamant in his beliefs, is ultimately wrong with his theories and ideas. 

***I DO NOT CLAIM TO BE THE OWNER OF ANY IMAGERY CONTAINED HEREIN.***

WHO:

• John F. Kennedy - President. Elected in 1960, killed in 1963. Kennedy was shot and killed by Lee Harvey Oswald. There are theories abounding as to why Kennedy was killed, and whether or not it was part of a conspiracy.
• 
• Lee Harvey Oswald - JFK’s assassin. If taking the Warren Report as absolute truth, Oswald acted alone. He was shot and killed two days after Kennedy’s death, by Jack Ruby.
• 
• Jack Ruby - Oswald’s murderer. When Oswald was being transferred from police HQ to the county jail, Ruby pulled out a pistol and shot Oswald in the stomach, a spectacle that was captured on live television. Oswald died in the same hospital as Kennedy had just two days before.

• The Warren Commission - The Congressional committee responsible for determining the final say in Kennedy’s death. They concluded that he was shot by Oswald alone.
• Jim Garrison - New Orleans D.A. who attempted to convict Clay Shaw on charges of conspiracy to assassinate the President. While Garrison’s case was unsuccessful, it served as inspiration for his book On The Trail Of The Assassins, serving as major basis for Oliver Stone’s film JFK.

• Clay Shaw/David Ferrie  - The men accused of conspiring with Oswald in the assassination. Ferrie could not be brought to court in his involvement, due to a fatal brain hemorrhage in 1967. The case first took to trial in January 1969. Shaw was found not guilty in his involvement in Kennedy’s death. The jury took less than an hour to acquit him.
• 

  Clay Shaw

1. JFK was killed by an assassin’s bullet. He WAS killed in Dallas, TX, and the time of death was, in fact, 1:00 CST. Amidst the conspiracies and wild theories, Stone maintained the basic details.
2. The characters were all real people. Jim Garrison, David Ferrie, Clay Shaw, Garrison’s law firm staff, Jack Ruby, the Senators. They were, however, greatly reinvented for the movie.
3. Clay Shaw’s trial wasn’t taken very seriously in real life, either. As stated earlier, Shaw was acquitted in less than an hour.
4. The chronology was all correct, down to the smaller details. (Oswald’s death and Dr. King’s assassination both happened at the same time as they were occurring in the film.)

Out of all the details, these are the major ones that would be most important to mention. As with any blockbuster Hollywood film, there will be plenty of story to reinvent and fabricate, but these are the situations that were, in fact, right. So while the movie is entertaining, and often an enthralling watch, all I can really give Mr. Stone is the following:

 

 

 

A for Effort.

I hated this movie. I am going to try and be objective in this blog-post about it, but really, John Ford tanked hardcore with My Darling Clementine. It wasn’t even the love story being 90 percent of the film’s plot. It wasn’t the blatant racism, although that was on the level of Gone With The Wind in its shock value. No, it was the fact that Ford, one of the more esteemed directors in the western genre, completely disregarded the facts behind the Gunfight at the OK Corral and instead decided to turn it into a sappy love story between a falsified Wyatt Earp and that Clementine chick.

Now, it must be said, I was raised on High Noon and Sergio Leone’s Man With No Name trilogy. I have an idea of what westerns “are supposed to be,” and was very disappointed when Clementine didn’t fit that mold.

My disdain for this flick could have come from the fact that the love story seemed like a b-story pushed to the forefront. It could have been that the gunfight sequences made up, from what I could gather, about 10-15 total minutes of the movie, despite (at least according to Netflix), the movie being about the Gunfight at the OK Corral! But really, I think it was the grand trifecta of a needless love story, blatant ignorance of the facts, and eyebrow-raising comments regarding the minorities in the film. Strike one, John Ford. Strike one.

BBC News. “On This Day: 22 November. 1963: Kennedy Shot Dead in Dallas.” Available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/22/newsid_2451000/2451143.stmInternet: Accessed on 15 October 2008.

BBC News. “On This Day: 24 November. 1963: Kennedy ‘assassin’ murdered.” Available from http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/november/24/newsid_3198000/3198106.stm. Internet: Accessed 15 October 2008.

JFK-Online. “The Trial Of Clay Shaw.” Available from http://www.jfk-online.com/chron.html Internet: Accessed 15 October 2008.

Simile. “The JFK Assassination Timeline.” Available from http://simile.mit.edu/timeline/examples/jfk/jfk.html. Internet: Accessed 15 October 2008.

U.S. Congress. House. Committee On Assassinations. The Final Assassinations Report. New York: Bantam, 1979.

I have to say that this is, as I’ve told a classmate, the PERFECT historical war film. Of all the movies we have watched, Glory is the one that REALLY gets everything as close to “Right” as a Hollywood movie can. As Dr.M explained, the South was NOT the only part of the nation that was racist. The hostility and resentment towards the blacks was something that never seemed exaggerated in this film, yet was never glossed over either. The importance of the 54th MA unit showed itself, and without a Disney-fied grandstanding.

However, I think the most important part is the fact that they did not try to change the events of the attack on the fort. Very often, especially with the pass we have given Hollywood to try and transform less-than-satisfactory results for a more Hollywood ending, these movies will try and tie a pretty bow around a less than pretty event. It was nice to see that Ed Zwick, known for About Last Night, thirtysomething and the (in my mind) overrated Blood Diamond, did not try to sanitize the results of this attack.

All in all, honestly, as close to perfection as we have seen. And this coming from a Denzel hater.

I seem to be the only person who does not feel that length is what hindered Gone With The Wind from being a watchable movie. I am admittedly a sucker for “longer” movies (The Two Towers, Gettysburg, and Apocalypse Now are three of my favorites) but I also realize that making a movie long, just for the sake of doing so can be its own undoing (see: Alexander or Troy).

No, length is not what bugged me about GWTW. As many of my classmates have expressed, the racism in the movie is, even for the time, unbearable. Knowing that this was going on behind the scenes as well only made it sadder. Much like Pocahontas, I do not believe this was supposed to be a spot-on recreation of what really happened in the South. It is a love story at heart, and it just happened to have the Civil War setting around it. As a love story, I think it accomplished what it set out to do. Isn’t that enough?

JFK Closing Statements on YouTube

The link above shows what I find to be the most important scene in the entire span of Stone’s epic JFK. In this scene, New Orleans prosecutor Jim Garrison is exhausted. He has spent years hunting the truth about Kennedy’s assassination, and he is trying to convince the jury - and the world - that Oswald did not work alone. 

While I view this as a vital scene in the movie, it gives perfect basis for dissecting the inaccuracies in Stone’s film. These inaccuracies will be examined at length by my final project, but I wanted everyone to get a chance to hear the general idea that both Jim Garrison and Oliver Stone ran with in trying to prove that JFK was not killed by just one man.

I want to start by saying that The Patriot is definitely the most accurate of the films we have watched so far. However, this does not mean I find it to be the best. Last of the Mohicans was a much better film in my opinion, with stronger characters and a far more believable love story. My biased enthusiasm for Daniel Day-Lewis as an actor may help with this, but Patriot did not strike me as a quality film whatsoever.

The first issue is found in the love story and poorly placed lightening of the mood. The jokes and cutesy mood never seemed to fit in with the rest of the story, especially when taken in context with the burning of the church and Mel Gibson’s brutal slaying of twelve or so British soldiers. I realize that Roland Emmerich was likely trying to keep this from being a Saving Private Ryan or Schindler’s List-esque exercise in soul-draining atmospherics, but “I’m here till Thursday, try the veal!” humor didn’t really have a place either.

Secondly, the villainy of the British seemed to be caricatured more than anything else. Lord Cornwallis seemed to have an adequate amount of dignity and honor in his position, however Colonel Tavington’s blind hatred for all things American was not only unbelievable, but insulting to the historical accounts of how the British soldiers would have behaved.

Finally, and perhaps most grumble-inducing, was Emmerich’s need to turn The Patriot into another Braveheart. There are ways around this. Don’t make the movie two and a half hours long when the 110-minute mark would have sufficed. Don’t cast Mel Gibson in a role virtually identical to that of the aforementioned Best Picture winner, but instead either evolve or restructure the character into something that isn’t a blatant color-by-numbers redux. Finally, don’t center a historical film around a love story. Just as Braveheart was dragged down by the needless William-and-Murron sidestory, The Patriot is dragged down by the love story between Gabriel and Anne. Maybe someone can send a memo to Michael Bay after Pearl Harbor on this matter as well.

I realize these may be relatively small issues. However, they really affected my enjoyment of the movie and thus kept me from truly being able to fully appreciate an otherwise solidly accurate historical slice of moviemaking.

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